Technology Today, September/October 1997

Telecommuting to and from Winsted

By MARY STAMM

On a quiet corner, with a lovely view of Winsted
Lake, stands a turn of the century home with hand laid steps and
oak floors. Resident inside this restful scene is some of the
newest technology available from TDS TELECOM, Winsted.

ISDN and the home office have arrived in Winsted.
Denise Hertzog, an employee of Cargill since 1984, recently began
doing her regular job out of her home on First Street South.

ISDN technology made this possible by transforming
some regular telephone lines in her home to digital lines that
can handle voice and data transmissions simultaneously and at
speeds five to 10 times faster than analog lines.

Why telecommute? In Denise's situation, she
is saving two hours a day by not commuting. She is also saving
money on gas and vehicle upkeep and a work wardrobe. Cargill has
a more satisfied, less stressed, more productive employee for
whom they do not need to provide expensive office space. In addition,
they have fewer employees on the road causing air pollution.

Denise has the perfect type of job for telecommuting.
The majority of her work is routine, with specific deadlines for
each task. She is fully trained and can handle her work independently.
Coworkers who need to interface with her during the day can easily
do so via electronic mail or telephone.

As a statistical analytical assistant for Cargill,
Denise updates multitudes of commodities supply and demand reports
each day by downloading data off the Internet and various government
bulletin boards. Once her reports are up-to-date, she loads them
onto Cargill's server, thus making them available for use by the
dozens of analysts who not only make important predictions and
decisions for Cargill, but also provide information and analysis
to business customers. Downloading large quantities of data requires
high speed transmission capabilities in order to make the process
efficient. The ISDN technology available in Winsted makes this
possible.

In addition to preparing important information
for Cargill analysts, Denise is also a data base administrator
for an information retrieval system that is used by Cargill and
some international analysis groups to monitor commodities supply,
demand, prices and options. By working out of her home office,
she is actually now more accessible to data base users than before,
because she has fewer distractions and interruptions.

Denise is excited about being allowed to participate
in the six-month telecommuting pilot program at Cargill. She first
read about telecommuting about three years ago and thought it
sounded like a neat idea. Now that she has a busy family life
and a beautiful home in Winsted, she thinks it's a very effective
solution to keeping her life balanced between an interesting and
challenging job and her personal life.

A major change that Denise has experienced
is much less stress on the job and at home. She does not need
to deal with traffic and weather concerns during a commute. She
has more hours in the day to spend on productive activities. She
does not have the frequent interruptions that she had in the office
environment.

Her office environment was like any other,
in that coworkers not only stop by for help or to discuss work
issues, they also tend to socialize from time to time. She has
found that many people, who found it so easy to rely on her for
help when they had the know-how themselves, are now operating
more independently. So the reduction in interruptions has not
only reduced her stress level, it has also increased her productivity
and that of others.

Another phenomenon Denise has observed is that
because she has signed a "work-at-home" agreement with
Cargill, and they are trusting her to fulfill her responsibilities,
she is extremely conscientious and self-disciplined. Her company's
trust in her and their willingness to be flexible have increased
her loyalty and commitment. A downside to telecommuting, however,
has been the isolation from other people. It has been challenging
for Denise to regain a level of social activity that can be important
to emotional well-being.

How will Cargill decide whether their pilot
telecommuting program has been successful? They are looking at
new costs associated with the set up and maintenance of the home
offices, and comparing these costs to the historical costs of
office space, equipment, supplies and commuting.

They are looking at their employees' productivity
levels in relation to the hours for which they're being paid.
They are evaluating the impact on communications among the work
groups. Consideration is being given to the overall satisfaction
level of the telecommuting employees and the attitudes and support
levels of the supervisors and employees that continue to work
in the Cargill office environment.

One thing Cargill learned through setting up
this pilot telecommuting program is that advanced technological
capabilities are available in Winsted. Denise is the only employee
who does not live in the twin cities area who is able to work
at home because the telecommunications technology is here. That
makes us in Winsted proud to know that we are once again on the
leading edge.

Oh, by the way, in case you're wondering -
Denise does not wear bunny slippers and pajamas while she's working.
She may be barefoot from time to time, though.